One of the most common questions asked about the Gerry Anderson shows is "Can I get it on video?". This feature documents the current availability of videos. It does not attempt to list every release since the 1980s, but does provide a complete picture of worldwide video availablity circa 2000.

UK Incredible voyage of Stingray	UK Channel 5 Thunderbirds	Canadian Thunderbirds	USA Thunderbirds
USA Thunderbirds are Go!	UK Joe 90	USA Doppleganger	UK Invasion UFO

The TV standards NTSC, PAL and SECAM

Over the years, most of Gerry Anderson's shows have been released on video. Unfortunately, the world uses 3 different TV broadcast standards instead of 1. The result is that not all videos are compatible with all video players and TVs. There are basically three TV broadcast standards:

• NTSC (used in USA, Canada and Japan)
• PAL (used in Great Britain, mainland Europe, Australia)
• SECAM (used in France, Greece, Russia)

Each TV system is different, NTSC uses 525 horizontal lines per image, wheras PAL and SECAM use 625 lines. The encoding system in PAL and SECAM are not campatible, hence we have three TV standards. These standards arewidely used in other countries not listed above. To find out more about TV standards, you can try the Society of Motion Picture and Television Engineers .

TVs and video decks are usually wired to work with only one broadcast standard (i.e. PAL) so that a PAL TV and video deck will only correctly play PAL tapes and transmissions. The video tape format (i.e. VHS) has no bearing whatsoever on the ability of the TV to reproduce the signal. In other words, if you put a PAL VHS tape into an NTSC VHS deck you will not get a viewable picture.

Video formats.

There are primarily 3 video storage formats in common use, VHS, Laserdisc and now DVD. These are storage formats like cassette and CD and are not to be confused with TV standards. VHS is by far the most widely used format. It is also the poorest in terms of quality. Over the years a surprisingly large percentage of Gerry Anderson's shows have been released, most notably, PAL/VHS in Great Britain and NTSC/Laserdisc in Japan.

DVD

DVD is a relatively new medium, but I think many of the Anderson shows will eventually be made available on DVD as it becomes the dominant video format. The picture quality is double that of VHS and you can get a lot of extra things on DVDs that VHS was never meant to support, for example multiple audio tracks. Looks like DVD will pick up where Laserdiscs left off. One problem with DVDs is that you cannot record on them (yet).

The real problem with DVDs is that not only do you have to deal with the NTSC/PAL/SECAM issue, but they also sliced up the world into 6 "REGIONs". The US is region 1 (of course) and the UK is region 2. When you buy your DVD player, it will have a region setting, this will prevent DVDs from other regions from playing on your player. So if I live in the US (I do) and I buy a region 2 disc, it will not work. Even if it did work (there are ways) you will still have to deal with the fact that the DVD disc is outputing PAL when you are in an NTSC country. Fun, eh? Before this all happened, I thought this was going to be like CDs, where you can get any CD from any country and it will work, as the videos are just MPEG encoded. That would be too easy. The region encoding is to prevent people in the "higher number" countries seeing the DVDs at the same time or before the movie plays in that country. Yeah, thanks.

Unless otherwise stated, all DVDs are REGION 2 (UK) and PAL. (Sorry)

Laserdiscs are an excellent format, but the technology is 20 years old and DVD is the next logical step. Sooner or later, DVD will be frowned upon, but until that day, DVD is the way to go.

The Videos

Lesson over. Here now is a complete listing of all of Gerry Anderson's shows available in all formats. If it is not in this list it means that it is almost certainly not available.

Some of the shows only exist as movies that have been edited together from various episodes. These were originally compiled in the 1980s and issued by "Family Home Entertainment" in the US and ITC in the UK. For more on this travesty, read this article by the producer.

The older UK releases were from when Polygram owned the shows. All they did was re-issue the Channel 5 stuff from 10 years ago. Since Carlton bought the ITC collection which includes most of the Gerry Anderson shows, they have spent a considerable amount of money cleaning up the shows for re-broadcast and re-issue on video. At the moment, the primary market for the ITC shows is the UK, but in the US, "New Video", the people behind the recent Avengers videos have the rights to some of the ITC shows such as Thunderbirds and The Prisoner.

Online ordering now available!

I have found some of these videos available online at a number of online dealers. As a result I have arranged with them to make their Anderson-related items available from this site. Items in the lists that are blue are available for secure order online. Items that can ordered this way are followed by a O symbol.

If you wish to check on other titles you can search the Amazon site directly from here:

If all else fails, just go ahead and leave the Tv21 site and browse the Amazon.com site directly.

The DVDs are also available from Blackstar. They offer 20% off pre-orders and free world-wide shipping.

 

What if the show I want is not on the list?

If they are not available normally, you can try to obtain older copies on laserdisc or VHS or you can search through toy and comic fairs for copies made from the UK tapes. This is the only way most of the Anderson shows will ever be available out of the UK and Austalia/Japan. They are of course, not legal copies, and I do not condone illegal copying of tapes. However, as a service to fans I provide the information above for people who REALLY want to see one of the shows again. One vendor has a web site where at least Thunderbirds is available in NTSC. I have not dealt with them, but have heard that they have decent tapes. They are Cinema Classics and their web site is http://cinemaclassics.com/cgi-bin/front.cgi#New

 

Don't give up hope

If the show you are seeking is not listed as available, don't despair, you can always purchase a multi-standard video player and TV, then buy the available video tapes! Alternatively, you might be able to locate dealers selling transfers from the PAL versions. Buyer beware, always insist on looking at the contents before handing over money. Too bad we have to resort to such tactics, if only they would release the shows in all formats a lot of people would not have to go to such lengths just to have a copy of a show we like.

A final note: if you happen to notice any inaccuracies in this or any document, please drop me a line so I can make the necessary correction.